The gray area of my immediate future as an MATC graduate

Please don’t ask me what I have planned for graduation later this month. If you do I’ll be forced to hastily fluff something up and put it behind a fake smile that I hope communicates optimism. I’ll want you to walk away from the exchange with a positive impression, but I’ll be silently embroiled in the anxiety that comes with defeatist fantasies of destitution. The thing is, you see, I do not have a sweet, new job lined up to tell you all about. I’d rather that wasn’t the case, but I’m struggling these days.
Maybe I should just start answering the question with the truthful response of “I don’t know.” I don’t know what I have planned for after graduation. I haven’t gotten that far and I haven’t really wanted to. I have so thoroughly enjoyed my time at MATC that finishing up my time is more bitter than sweet. There has been such value for me in the cocoon of learning and experience I’ve thrived in since my very first TV production classes. Thinking about leaving it is almost too much to bear. I can certainly understand the students who seemingly never leave MATC and shape what appears to be a career by staying enrolled. I could be one of them! But I can’t. People have expectations for me.
Perhaps that’s why you’re wondering about my future so much so that you want to ask me about it. You’ve encountered my smile in the halls or shared a class where I knocked a presentation out of the park. You want something good to happen to me now, maybe because that reaffirms your vision for how the world should work, or maybe you want to feel satisfied with the service you’ve provided me as a member of MATC’s faculty or staff. Thanks for that, by the way. So what’s the issue that has allowed me to write such a cynical piece such as this for publication? Well, it’s not something I’ve deemed appropriate for the brief, hallway chat about my future that you’re expecting next time we cross paths.
There’s a problem I’ve identified within myself that I’ve successfully hidden from you through bombast and a strong handshake; I am not a confident person. When I browse upon lists of available positions in the field of my education, I don’t immediately identify myself as the perfect candidate. I instead wonder how in the world anyone would hire a goofball like me. This isn’t a new problem, and it isn’t something this school has fixed. Because it can’t, even with the Dean’s List or the @DiscoverMATC tweets about journalism awards or the MPTV Channel 36 premieres of full-length television shows I’ve produced, directed and starred in. Low self-esteem isn’t an uncommon problem in society today, but that doesn’t allow me the space to openly share that in a job interview with an HR professional who desperately wants to know why I’m the one they’ve been searching for.
If you ask me what I have planned for after graduation, I might crack a joke about going back to washing cars, which was a task I performed before I started attending college. The joke will be a mask and a truth. I might actually go back to washing cars, but I won’t be laughing about it. I have nightmares about going back to washing cars. But at least I know it’s an option. I was once very good at washing cars, and I think it’s an admirable profession for those that are satisfied with what it offers. I don’t want to wash cars, however, and that was a driving force in my enrollment here. A few years go by and now I’ve edited and designed newspapers. I’ve directed live television. I operated the “hero” camera at a Carrie Rodriguez concert, and I loved every second of it. I want more of that stuff. If the confetti of the pity party I’m throwing right now keeps getting shot out of the cannons, I won’t be doing any of those tasks as a professional anytime soon. Why? The answer can’t be skill and experience. MATC provided me both of those in spades. It’s because the mean things my brain tells me about myself feel the most true.
In a few short weeks, my tenure as Editor-in-Chief of a college newspaper will be over. My name will be on a plaque in the Times office as proof that it did, in fact, happen. The memories from this position and from all the classes I’ve finished here will reside in my psyche to get conjured up and drive me bonkers when I find myself wiping the inside of the back windshield of some habitual cigarette smoker’s Buick Century. I’ll remember everything I’ve accomplished and learned at MATC and it’ll break my heart.
Golly, that sounds sad. I don’t want that at all. On second thought, please ask me what I have planned for after graduation. Don’t accept any jokingly glib answers from me either. Tell me you have expectations for me, and you don’t care about the preciousness of my ego. Ask me how many jobs I’ve applied for and how many contacts I’ve touched base with that week. I need a little more from you yet, MATC. I need you to not let me disappoint you.